The immediate past Chairman, Board of Fellows (BOF) of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN), Professor Mbang Femi- Oyewo, has called on deans of faculties of pharmacy in Nigeria to actively encourage their students to participate in school politics. This, she says, will prepare the students to participate in national politics when they eventually graduate.
Femi-Oyewo made this call at the plenary session of the recently concluded 94th Annual National Conference of the PSN, held in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
During the session, themed “Strengthening Pharmacy Practice through Political Action, some pharmacy students and young pharmacists had complained that their lecturers were not encouraging them to participate in their school politics, as some deliberately scheduled important academic activities, such as tests, for the same time that other students were busy with campus politics.
“We will rather go for our test, rather than going for political visits or engaging in any campus political activities, because we don’t want to fail”, one of the pharmacy students said.
The young pharmacists lamented that since they were not participating in politics right from school, it would be difficult to show interest in national politics when they finish their studies.
Reacting to the complaints, Femi-Oyewo, a former dean of the Faculty of Pharmacy, Olabisi Onabanjo University, Abeokuta, concurred that such anomaly must be immediately addressed.
According to her, “For lecturers to be fixing tests on the day of political visit or political activities in the campus is wrong. It is an anomaly. It is the fault of the dean. The dean of every faculty of pharmacy should discourage such development.”
Speaking further, the former BOF chairman said, “When I was the dean of faculty of pharmacy at Olabisi Onabanjo University, I allowed my students to participate in campus politics. We gave them moral support. Eventually, our student won an election as Student Union Government (SUG) president of the school.
“All deans of faculties of pharmacy should start encouraging pharmacy students to participate in campus politics.”
Prof. Oyewo, Our wonderful Mummy 😊